Pas (Pan-Malaysia Islamic Party) and its `Ulama's leadership'

PAS was founded as a political party which advocates Malaynationalism and Islamism in 1951. But it has strengthened its inclination to Islamic universalism gradually in the current of Dakwa movements and it established the leadership of‘Ulamâ'after the reformation of its organization concluding with the the triumph of its Islamist camp and the ouster of Malay-nationalist wing from its leadership in 1982/3. Since the establishment of the leadership of ‘Ulamâ', PAS succeeded in a conversion from Malay-nationalist party to Islamic universalist one, and from the radical to the moderate at the same time. Its Supreme Leader Nik AbdulAziz, an Islamic jurist, became the Prime Minster of State of Kelantan 1990, and in the general election in 1999, its Vice President AbdulHadi Awang, another Islamic jurist, was elected as the Prime Minster of State of Terengganu. Since the success of Islamic revolution in Iran in 1979, PAS is the only political party in Sunni Muslim world which officially institutionalizes the leadership of ‘Ulamâ' in order to establish Islamic State and succeeded in attaining political power by the democratic election and has maintained it, even on the state level. Accordingly PAS is deserving of more attention and study for estimating the future of the relationship between Islamism and democratization in the Sunni Muslim world.